Truck beds are subject to substantial amounts of wear and tear due to the nature of the various types of cargo carried, the lack of care utilized by those placing the cargo in the bed and withdrawing it from the bed, and various environmental effects. Reconstruction of the truck bed is a substantial and costly procedure usually resulting in retirement of the entire vehicle.
Beside wear and tear, transportation of large, unsecured goods or payloads in shipping and transport vehicles such as trucks, vessels and other movable vehicles, also creates a hazard due to object shifting movement during transport. To prevent this hazard, such objects are typically fastened to the walls of the vehicle with straps or ropes, which requires convenient attachment points for both the article transported and on the floor and the wall surface of the transport vehicle. Such strap or rope securing requires multiple fastening points, is tedious, difficult to quickly set up and undo if access to the articles are required. As a result, goods, and especially smaller packages and items are carried unsecured due to the inconvenience of securing the goods.
When a smaller truck, e.g. “pick-up” style truck, is used, the interior floor, or bed, is often lined with a rigidly formed heavy plastic aftermarket bed liner to protect the interior of the truck bed and to add improved aesthetic effects. The most common and least expensive bed liner is a plastic drop-in style that not only protects the truck bed, but is also very light weight. Despite its advantages, the bed liner is often extremely slippery and covers convenient points for anchoring the transported article, discouraging the securing of the goods. Thus, the truck bed liners often exacerbate the pickup truck operators' problems of securing goods, who place a premium on ease of operation while not detracting from the usefulness or esthetics of the aftermarket truck products used. Moreover, movement between the container of a flammable material and the bed liner can generate static electricity which could cause combustion and explosion of flammable material such as from a small gas can, especially in pick-up trucks with enclosed beds.
Various types of cargo restraints have been proposed. U.S. Pat. No. 6,511,270 to Burke et al. discloses a clamp to be placed against cargoes carried in a truck or other vehicle including a corrugated bed liner. The clamp comprises one or more pairs of movable opposing jaws, each pair selectively engaging a rib of the truck bed liner. The clamp jaws are slidebly retained in grooves in a clamp frame, and moved by spirally disposed grooves in a disk rotated by a connected latchable lever to close or open the jaws against the rib of the bed liner. Anchoring apertures can also be included to further secure the cargo with rope or strapping.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,689,864 to White discloses a clamp for securing objects against a structure adjacent to and on either side of a rib of the structure. The clamp contains first and second arms, which are pivotally coupled to one another at a pivot point. The arms define a pair of opposing jaws that engage the rib and a pair of levers extending away from the opposing jaws on either side of the rib. A threaded member cooperating with each lever is rotated towards the structure. An object is positioned between each threaded member and the structure. In this way, the threaded members press the objects securely against the structure as the opposing jaws grip the rib.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,717,298 to Bott discloses a cargo restraint system for the bed of a truck. The restraint system contains at least one primary cargo securing element and cargo securing members clampingly engageable with the primary cargo-securing element. The primary element resembles track and is secured on the bed liner by fasteners. The cargo-securing members, slidable on the track provided by the primary cargo-securing element, are clamped to the primary elements to hold the cargo in place.
Other cargo restraint systems for truck beds, vans, and station wagons generally are limited by the nature of the cargo to be utilized. With pick-up trucks and similar load carrying vehicles, cargo is generally variable in size and a multi-faceted, multi-purpose cargo restraint system is highly valuable. With the ever increasing use of pick-up trucks, vans, station wagons, and the like which also have other day-to-day uses, such as commuting to and from work, for which some aesthetic appeal is desirable, a means of retaining aesthetic appeal in the vehicle used is also significant.